Memorandum of European Economists
1
Memorandum of European Economists, May 1997
Memorandum of European Economists:
Full Employment, Social Cohesion and Equity for Europe - Alternatives to Competitive Austerity
1. Introduction: Persistent Mass Unemployment - The Challenge of European Decline
We are worried about the social, economic and political situation in Europe. As economists working in most of the member countries of the European Union (EU) we observe with deep concern that unemployment in our countries has risen and continues to rise to unprecedentedly - and intolerably - high levels and that economic policy is not taking energetic measures against this development. In the absence of an effective employment policy, poverty and exclusion in the EU are further increasing, exacerbating economic and social divisions, making for polarisation, leading to more inequality and injustice in society. This pattern of development also threatens political stability and democratic structures and gives rise to xenophobia and increasingly virulent euroscepticism. At present the EU seems to be locked into a vicious cycle: a series of mutually self-reinforcing negative-sum games with increasingly harmful consequences. In our view it is essential to reverse this trend and to re-establish a pattern of positive-sum games, based on firm cooperation, from which all parties will benefit.
We regard the present dismal situation as one result of an economic strategy which is presented to the public as the only valid one, whereas we think that it rests on theoretically very controversial and to a substantial degree utterly wrong foundations. It is often linked to the process of European integration and particularly to the Treaty of Maastricht (TM), which dominates the current phase of European integration, although, in our view, there are other and better paths to European unity.
For many governments the criteria of convergence of the TM are now the exclusive source of economic policy targets, and they are presented as the only policy option in a context of globalisation. National budgets are limited by strict deficit and debt restrictions; on the other hand there is no sign of an appropriate, corresponding expansion of the EU budget to offset contractionary effects and resulting distortions within the Community. In the envisaged monetary union monetary control will be entrusted to an independent central bank which will be forbidden to fund any public programs and which has, as its exclusive purpose the control of inflation. We certainly endorse low rates of inflation as one economic policy goal, but we reject the idea that economic stability means nothing more than price stability and that therefore economic policy can be reduced to disinflationary measures. Unemployment on the other hand is regarded as the result of excessive rigidities in the labour market and the blame for unemployment is thus put on the unemployed, the employed and the unions. The Economic and Financial Council of the European Commission relentlessly reiterates its recommendation for more flexibility in both wage-setting and employment conditions.
These principles, which some regarded as a transitory policy to achieve convergence different economies by 1999, will be perpetuated after that date, according to the provisions of the TM reinforced by the "stability pact" signed in Dublin in December 1996, which reasserts that budgetary restrictions and the control of inflation are the essence of a "sound" economic policy.
This policy may be coherent from a fundamentalist free-market standpoint in that its main postulates are: down-scaling of the role of state and society in the economy, fiscal restructuring in favour of firms and higher income groups, continuous increases in the share of profits in national income, abandonment of all restrictions to the free international circulation of capital, further deregulation of labour markets. These are the neoliberal policies that have already been practised for more than fifteen years in most countries of the EU, which have redistributed national incomes in favour of profits, strengthened and widened the grip of private investors on the development of the economy, and limited the range of economic policy choices to those approved by the financial markets. They have at the same time proved incapable of checking the growth of unemployment, poverty, inequality and exclusion. From a market-radical perspective, however, unemployment and insecurity are not evils to be fought with the highest priority; they are regarded as side-effects to be treated, at best, by social policy, or even worse, as levers to discourage any idea of resistance on the part of wage-earners.
This strategy, now imposed on all countries wishing to join the Monetary Union in 1999, is creating the most important deflationary risks since World War II. Public deficits increase because of falling tax revenue; and this is followed by tax increases and/or further cuts in public expenditure with an ensuing fall in effective demand, lower employment, lower income and tax revenue, higher deficits etc., thus continuing the vicious circle. Most countries will not meet the convergence criteria - but in trying to do so, governments apply austerity measures that will foster further unemployment, deficits and social tensions. Further, the design of a two-speed Europe in which the main policy emphasis lies on disinflation does not promote the unification of Europe; apart from exacerbating social inequalities and imbalances within member countries it will create new divisions and polarisations among member countries - and it will establish new barriers between EU-members and third countries.
Unemployment is very often an individual catastrophe for those concerned. It is an economic waste and a burden on public budgets; it is also a political danger, leading to intimidation, to more authoritarian structures and, at the same time, more instability. Therefore we regard unemployment as the most urgent social problem in the EU. We are particularly concerned that, at the same time, even the modest proposals for enhancing employment which the Commission made in its White Paper at the summit of 1993 have in practice been dropped from the European economic policy agenda.
We are opposed to these developments. Our criticism, however, is by no means anti-European as is sometimes suggested to the public. We have nothing in common with those parties and politicians who reject Maastricht for nationalist reasons - or because the design of EMU is not neoliberal enough. We strongly reject such attitudes. For us, any successful economic strategy must have a European dimension: in our view the prevailing economic policy contributes more to further polarisation in Europe than to European unification. It rests on theoretically wrong foundations which serve the interests of a minority but are harmful for the majority of people. Therefore we propose an alternative economic strategy for Europe which, while restoring employment, social security and equity will establish a stable basis for unity among European peoples.
We are encouraged in our approach by the fact that recent years have seen the beginning of social movements in several countries, often as resistance to social cuts. We support this resistance and hope to contribute to it in our professional capacities. As European economists we feel a responsibility to criticise the narrow economic discourse which has led to the present incorrect and damaging policies and to show that - in spite of tendencies to globalisation - there are alternatives to that policy. The allegedly scientific justification of free-market radicalism is in fact a caricature of economics as a science. There is indeed a debate amongst economists. While the dominant mainstream orthodoxy is far from supplying a genuinely scientific foundation for the economic policies of the last decade, we recognise that heterodox approaches in our discipline have their limits too, and are a long way from presenting solutions for all problems. On the other hand, by elaborating alternatives to current strategies they work to widen the field of possible policy options. In advancing alternatives we hope to challenge the "pensée unique" predominant in mainstream economic thinking and contribute to a broader public debate on the ways to full employment, welfare and equity in Europe.
In this memorandum we shall:
- present a brief criticism of current economic strategies, focusing first on their general theoretical foundations and then on their specific applications and consequences in the context of the European Union (chapter 2);
- formulate objectives and proposals for an alternative strategy in Europe, putting forward full employment, environmental protection, social security and equity as the central policy priorities (chapter 3). We do not claim that these proposals - which are focused on monetary, fiscal and labour market policies and on the reduction of working time - cover the whole range of necessary and feasible policy options, nor do we think that our proposals have reached some state of ultimate wisdom. Where we propose concrete policy measures, these often serve as examples to illustrate the direction of the new policy. They can, of course be replaced by equivalent measures, and need to be complemented by others;
- conclude by pointing out that the change of economic strategy which we propose is a very ambitious challenge; it requires thorough and differentiated policy design; its implementation on different policy levels is a complex task which involves both intellectual effort and the political energy and mobilisation necessary to overcome resistance from the powerful forces which gain from the prevailing strategy (chapter 4).
2. The Maastricht Agenda: a Threat to Welfare, Justice and European Unity
Both the design for Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) which was adopted at Maastricht and the “convergence process” which is meant to prepare the way foe EMU represent serious dangers to employment and economic development in the European Union. Here we make a critical assessment of these strategies and of their effects on European society.
2.1. The Turn to Free-Market Strategies
Since the mid-eighties, the main strategic choices of the European Community (now the EU) have been more and more focused on the intensification of market disciplines and competitive pressures. Other policy objectives and other policy methods have been increasingly subordinated to the pursuit of market-led integration.
The reasons for this shift are to be found in profound changes in the member states, changes both in economic circumstances and in the political climate. On the one hand the previous path of European economic development faced serious obstacles, internal and external, which called into question established patterns of economic intervention and control: at national level these included barriers to the continued expansion of the given industrial structure; internationally, there were instabilities which, for increasingly open economies, were difficult to control. On the other hand, these obstacles became the occasion for a reassertion, by conservative political groupings and important business interests, of free-market doctrines in the form of neoliberalism: it was asserted that there was no essential role for the state or for the public sector in the construction of a new model of economic development; rather the role of the state was to clear the way for an expansion and intensification of market relations, which, it was claimed, would themselves lead to a spontaneous recovery of investment and thus to renewed economic advance.
As such ideas, and the forces behind them, became increasingly influential throughout Europe, they began to dominate both the form and the content of the project for European integration. The first major expression of this linkage was the single market programme which attempted to drive integration forward by eliminating barriers to market relations among member states. The second was the programme for Economic and Monetary Union agreed at Maastricht, which aims at monetary integration according to rigid and dogmatic formulae placing exclusive emphasis on monetary disinflation and the reduction of public expenditures. At the same time other ambitions for Europe, in the field of social policy for example, have been virtually marginalised.
In our view, European integration has been and remains a contested domain, in which a variety of political forces seek to influence the political and economic character of European institutions. At present, however, the EU’s own policy agenda is closely aligned with the policy agenda proposed by neoliberalism and conforms to its priorities: deregulation, privatisation, public expenditure and tax reductions, disinflation by means of monetary restriction and so on. The reasons for this state of affairs are complex: they certainly include the strength of the industrial, commercial and financial interests which actively promote these policies; on the other hand, it is also true that there are difficulties in formulating and popularising a coherent alternative strategy and that these difficulties encourage the political forces which are committed to European integration to hold to the existing agenda despite its increasingly obvious adverse effects on the populations which integration is meant to serve.
Our main goal in this document is to contribute to the formulation of just such an alternative strategy. Nevertheless, it is necessary to begin by emphasising the dangerous consequences of the present EU agenda.
Our objections to this agenda are based both on principle and on experience. Against the doctrine of neoliberalism we argue on principle: that it involves an extreme individualism which undermines solidarity and social responsibility; that, in treating private property as the basis of the social order, it ignores the limits to property rights which must be imposed by any democratic society; that it exaggerates the capacity of market exchange to organise economic relations and thus fails to see the role of political and social processes in the orientation of economic agents; finally, that, in spite of its professed opposition to state control, it involves a repressive state in reality since only a strong state can impose the disciplines which it requires and contain the social conflicts to which it leads.
Beyond these points of principle, however, we also insist on the actual damage and dislocation which can be traced to the policies influenced by contemporary free market doctrines, and in particular to the post-Maastricht agenda of the European Union.
2.2. Neoliberalism in the European Union
In this section we focus our criticism more narrowly on the main elements and recommendations of the Maastricht economic agenda, on their economic and social inconsistencies, and on their consequences.
At present, the field of macroenonomic policy illustrates the immense gap between the potential contribution of the EU to European development and its actual role, which has been, in recent years, to disorganise national economies and to intensify, rather than relax, the external constraints they face.
In the name of a dogmatic doctrine of purely monetary stabilisation, and on the quite unfounded assumption that market adjustments alone suffice to bring about economic modernisation, EU macro policy has established a contractionary regime in which restrictive, supposedly disinflationary, money and credit policies and a drastic, almost panic-stricken, tightening of fiscal policies have combined to obstruct development and to suppress employment. In both cases, policy is self-defeating in that it prevents that stabilisation of the productive system which would be the only sound basis for financial and monetary stability.
The issues at stake go beyond the immediate impact of macro policy on employment, although it is undeniable that the present macro regime is destroying jobs. In a longer perspective, this regime is also failing to challenge the chronic uncertainties which inhibit investment or to control the diversion of investment resources into a universal search for remunerative liquid portfolios, which has forced national governments, around the world, into a competitive escalation of interest rates.
A. The main elements of neoliberal strategy in the European Union and their criticism
Firstly, European macroeconomic policy is almost entirely reduced to the control of inflation.In achieving macroeconomic equilibrium, contemporary orthodoxy regards the fight against inflation as the key objective of economic policy. This fight is given almost exclusive priority, although economic stability involves much more than price stabilisation - e.g. stabilisation of production, of employment and of the environment - and although almost all economies in the EU currently display very low levels of inflation which no longer represent any danger to development. In the EU (15 members), the rate of inflation for private consumption, which was 13,2% in 1980 and 10,6% on average in the 1970s has fallen to 6,5% in the 1980s and to 2,6% in 1996 and there is no indication of an upward turn. But lowering it even further is still regarded as the main policy concern. This is all the more striking because, not so long ago, it was recognised that a positive but low rate of inflation might provide an optimal stimulus to business activity. Furthermore, choosing the control of inflation as the main, or even the exclusive, policy objective implies that growth, employment, income and welfare are regarded as at most subsidiary aims - while a clean environment is usually completely disregarded. The goal of a very low inflation rate, uniform throughout the EU, is particularly damaging to the Southern European countries, where sectoral disparities give rise to acute inflationary pressures: simplifying the question to some extent, we can say that wide differences in productivity growth among sectors, combined with a similar rate of growth of wage rates, lead to much bigger price increases in those with limited productivity gains. As these price pressures diffuse through the economy they lead to what can be described as structural inflation. To address these structural inflationary pressures simply by restrictive macroeconomic measures involves very high social costs in terms of unemployment.
Secondly, corresponding to this obsession with fighting inflation, there is no scope for an explicit employment policy: Officially registered unemployment in the EU15 has risen from an average of 4,0% in the 1970s to 8,9% in the 1980s and to 11,2% in 1996. And yet an explicit employment policy is nonexistent in the current European strategy. Employment policy, on the basis of free-market orthodoxy, is reduced to recommendations - and legislation - for more 'flexibility' in the labour market and for wage austerity as well as lower social standards in order to diminish the cost of labour. Although the real unit cost of labour has fallen in the EU15 from 100 in 1980 to 87 in 1996 (more than in the US and Japan, where the relative decrease was from 100 to 97,6 and to 94,0 respectively) it is maintained that raising employment requires more mobility and lower wages. Thus, on the one hand, responsibility for unemployment is placed on the unemployed and, on the other, unemployment is not regarded as an evil which should be fought energetically: a "natural rate of unemployment" is seen as inevitable in a well functioning economy, and a "non accelerating inflation rate of unemployment" (NAIRU) is, in this view, necessary and therefore an objective of policy.